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Climate warming disrupts mast seeding and its fitness benefits in European beech.

Abstract

Many plants benefit from synchronous year-to-year variation in seed production, called masting. Masting benefits plants because it increases the efficiency of pollination and satiates predators, which reduces seed loss. Here, using a 39-year-long dataset, we show that climate warming over recent decades has increased seed production of European beech but decreased the year-to-year variability of seed production and the reproductive synchrony among individuals. Consequently, the benefit that the plants gained from masting has declined. While climate warming was associated with increased reproductive effort, we demonstrate that less effective pollination and greater losses of seeds to predators offset any benefits to the plants. This shows that an apparently simple benefit of climate warming unravels because of complex ecological interactions. Our results indicate that in masting systems, the main beneficiaries of climate-driven increases in seed production are seed predators, not plants.

Acceptance Date Dec 28, 2019
Publication Date Feb 10, 2020
Publicly Available Date Mar 28, 2024
Journal Nature Plants
Print ISSN 2055-026X
Publisher Nature Publishing Group
Pages 88 - 94
DOI https://doi.org/10.1038/s41477-020-0592-8
Keywords Climate, European beech, mass seeding, climate warming.
Publisher URL https://www.nature.com/articles/s41477-020-0592-8#article-info

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